FOOD CONTROL IN NIGERIA DURING WORLD WAR II, 1939-45

Abstract

This study examines food shortage and its management in Nigeria duringWorld War II, 1939-1945. Using primary archival sources, it argues thatthe ‘policy’ of food control was one of the preparatory steps takenmonths before the outbreak of the war, and that the actual practice offood control (namely, price-fixing, restriction on the movement offoodstuffs, and rationing) did not end with the war, but was extendedinto the post-war period due to the World Food Crisis (1946-48) thatfollowed immediately after the Second World War was over, leading tohardship, black market, and editorials against this extension.